Man Arrested for Mailing Suspicious Packages to D.C. Area Military Facilities

Thanh Cong Phan, a 43-year-old man from the Seattle, Washington area, was arrested today on suspicion of being responsible for sending roughly one dozen suspicious packages to military installations in the Washington, D.C. area.

According to the Associated Press, the packages “were similarly designed and contained black powder along with rambling, nonsensical notes similar to those the man has been known to send in the past,” with authorities noting that “other ‘destructive devices’” may yet be unaccounted for.

Secretary of Defense James Mattis said each of the packages sent to DOD facilities had been intercepted by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).

“Basically there’s a set procedure, they went through the procedure,” Mattis said. “We’ve had nobody injured and all those packages and all the evidence is accessible and is the hands of the FBI right now.”

The Associated Press lists several of the intended targets of what it says were roughly a dozen packages. The list includes “Joint Base Anacostia-Bolling and Fort Lesley J. McNair in the district; at Fort Belvoir, in Virginia; the Naval Surface Warfare Center Dahlgren Division, in Dahlgren, Virginia; and the CIA.”